Foreign Perspectives

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In an ideal world, a direct non-stop flight is definitely the way to go. One check-in and you’re gone.

However, the growth of discount airlines means that in many cases an indirect route is considerably cheaper and can also offer you a lot more choice in the way of departure times. The downsides are that you generally need to collect your bags and check-in for the second flight and you run the risk of a delay on the first flight knocking you off the second one.

The bags sure are a hassle but if you’re travelling light, it’s a manageable one. Where you do need to be careful about is the time between arriving from the first flight and departing on the second one which needs to allow for delays. You could go with the minimum time between flights in a terminal but are better to add an hour or two (possibly more at peak times) to be sure of making the connection. Actually, at peak times I’d be inclined not to risk it if the second airline is a discount one (”normal” airlines will let you go on the next flight, discount ones will sell you another ticket).

Funnily enough you seem to get these flights cheaper. So, for example, my flight next week is around £70 for a direct non-stop one vs £50 for the two stage one. Not only that, but the £70 flight gets me here after midnight whereas the two stager gets me here for teatime which is always a lot easier on the system.

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It seems like aeons ago when we were all routinely pampered with blankets, pillows, endless food & drink, socks, little “do not disturb” signs, toothbrushes, combs and even flight bags. Actually, you needed the flight bag to carry off all the goodies that you were given in those days. That was in economy too… in first class you’d have needed porters to take everything with you!

Everything is different now of course in the age of the discount airline. The food & drink only turns up if you pay for it, the flight bag has long since been consigned to history and they’ve even cut into the basics such as blankets and pillows which often aren’t even adequately stocked on planes never mind being at least the little bit overstocked as they were yesteryear.

Funnily enough it’s actually the summer season when travelers end up feeling cold or even freezing. That’s the season when everyone’s heading off to the beaches and leaving home when it’s fairly warm too so they’re traveling in their summer attire of t-shirts, shorts, skirts and light clothing generally.

What do you do about it though? Well, you could cart on a blanket and pillow but, frankly, you’d look like a complete plonker doing so and besides you’ve got to factor the weight into your greatly reduced luggage allowance. It’s also two carryon items which may not be allowed but anyway, do you really want to juggle two more things on your vacation? However, finally a company has sat down and thought this one through and come up with the Cabin Cuddler which gives you the advantages of the best of the sleeping bag type cum blanket things and pillow that you used to get and all in a sensible sized little bag that you can carry on easily.

Except that it’s better because you can use it at the gate which is where we seem to be stuck longer and longer each year. I’d have killed for one of these that time I was stuck in Athens at some totally ridiculous time of the morning not so long ago which taught me that even in the height of summer, airports in the hottest of countries are seriously cold early in the morning.

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If you’re living outside your home country then the answer isn’t an obvious one.

Say you’re living in France and you’re from the UK. In that case, the language you use within the family will be English whilst the language you use outside the home will usually be French, won’t it?

Well, not necessarily. For example, in our case for a variety of reasons this year less than 10% of our guests were French. Thus, in practical terms in 90% of the time we ended up using English with the guests. That’s not because they were British mind you because under 10% were; it’s because of that 90% non-French clientele, almost all of them had a preference to communicate in English rather than French (they were largely German and Dutch).

Which has resulted in a series of odd complaints, mainly from the French guests. We weren’t greeting everyone in French, nobody spoke French, etc. Seeing as we can see where the various cars come from as people arrive we actually greet them in the most appropriate language we can muster whether that be English, French or Spanish. If it’s a German number plate then we kick off in English because we know that 99% of them speak it better than we do.

What we can’t obviously do is insist that all the guests speak French as one French couple seemed to want going by their complaint. In fact, they were the only French couple staying that day and were surrounded by Germans, Dutch and Spanish who all chose to speak English to each other whilst having breakfast.

The peculiar common thread behind these complaints is that the French seemingly assume that in a French hotel all the staff will be French and so will all the guests which seems pretty weird in these days of widespread international travel.

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